I’m likely not alone in this, but from time to time I get emails claiming something that just doesn’t sound right. We all get the ones who promise riches if we’ll only help a Nigerian Prince get his money, but I also get ones that other people seem to believe.

I’ve gotten emails from family and friends claiming that President Obama is a secret Muslim, that he really was born in Kenya, that the 2010 census demanded that we list the number of guns we own, etc. What has always amazed me is that a quick search on Google or Snopes would show these banal claims to be false. My attempts to hit the “reply all” button with these suggestions has been a waste of time.

Today I read a CNN story that a blogger named Nate St.Pierre wrote a post claiming Abraham Lincoln filed a patent claim in 1845 for what we now know as Facebook.

Here is an excerpt from the blog post:

Lincoln was requesting a patent for “The Gazette,” a system to “keep People aware of Others in the Town.” He laid out a plan where every town would have its own Gazette, named after the town itself. He listed the Springfield Gazette as his Visual Appendix, an example of the system he was talking about. Lincoln was proposing that each town build a centrally located collection of documents where “every Man may have his own page, where he might discuss his Family, his Work, and his Various Endeavors.”

He went on to propose that “each Man may decide if he shall make his page Available to the entire Town, or only to those with whom he has established Family or Friendship.” Evidently there was to be someone overseeing this collection of documents, and he would somehow know which pages anyone could look at, and which ones only certain people could see (it wasn’t quite clear in the application). Lincoln stated that these documents could be updated “at any time deemed Fit or Necessary,” so that anyone in town could know what was going on in their friends’ lives “without being Present in Body.”

That was it. Pretty much just a simple one-page overview of how his system would work. After we read it, we both sat there quiet for a long time. It was so obvious what this was, guys.

A patent request for Facebook, filed by Abraham Lincoln in 1845.

The funny thing is that the whole thing was a complete fabrication, existing only in the mind of Mr. St. Pierre. My gripe with these hoaxes is the not the stupidity of the people who make them up, but in the stupidity in those who pass them along or publish them. It was published on the web page of Forbes magazine and ZNET.

This never ceases to amaze me. In the 1980s I heard about a hoax that (then) Vice President Dan Quayle was eager to go to Latin America so he could practice his Latin. I got a laugh but then asked if it was true (it wasn’t). Since then the question “Is it true?” is the question nobody else seems to ask.

Maybe this story will help give credibility to this question.

Well, I guess we can all stop hoping for a one way ticket to Heaven and the pleasure of watching the world end. I wrote posts in April, May, and June about Harold Camping and Family Radio. Harold has a program on Family Radio and last winter he proclaimed that on May 21st everyone who is right with God will be taken up to Heaven. From May 21st to October 21st the world will be populated by those left behind and on October 21st God will destroy the world and everyone on it.

This was bad news for everyone, but mostly for Harold Camping: May 21st came and went and nobody disappeared (at least nobody we noticed). Mr. Camping went into hiding for a few days and emerged to say that he was still right. His explanation of this was posted here. Frankly I have a hard time following the article, but here’s what it sounds like to me: May 21st was a “spiritual rapture” where God decides who will be saved and who will not. On October 21st (presumably at the same time) the righteous will be raptured and everyone else will be destroyed.

Unfortunately he did not give a time. On May 21st Mr. Camping claimed the rapture would be at 6PM but did not specify a time zone. He lives in Oakland, California and I took it to be 6PM local time. But here I am, in the same time zone as Mr. Camping, looking at the clock and it’s now a little after 8:30PM. That means it’s 11:30PM in New York, 5:30AM (October 22nd) in Paris, and 12:30PM (October 22nd) in Tokyo. If you’re going to specify a time for the Rapture, please be specific about your time zone.

In any case, Mr. Camping said the May 21st event would leave the world intact, but less populated. But the October 21st event would destroy the world and to the extent that any of us are still here, it appears Mr. Camping is running out of justification. There is a donations button on Family Radio’s web page. I suggest that nobody click on it.

By the way, if you’re looking for another chuckle, here’s where you can buy a rapture survival kit.

Ok I’m having too much fun with this, but does anyone else see the resemblance between Lenny Montana who played Luca Brasi in The Godfather and New Jersey Governor Chris Christie?

I’m not telling anyone who to vote for, but we all have to admit Vito Corleone knew how to get things done.

I’ve been working as a chaplain for San Diego Hospice for 6 1/2 years now and I continue to find it a rich and rewarding experience. We at hospice constantly battle misconceptions about the care we provide, and one of the most tenacious is the belief that we only come in for the last few days or hours of life. Always the innovator, we’ve produced a short 7 minute video called “5 Lives” that is currently on You Tube.

On a previous post I talked about Harold Camping who has a program on Family Radio. While having no formal education in Scripture (his background is in civil engineering), he presents himself as an expert on the Bible, and particularly in predicting the Rapture (this is the belief that at a fixed point in time God will take the righteous directly into Heaven and leave Earth in the hands of Satan who will have his way with those remaining before God destroys the world). Mr. Camping predicted that the Rapture would be May 21, 2011 at 6PM.

This should surprise nobody but his deadline came and went without anything happening. For what it’s worth I texted a few of my chaplain colleagues at 6:15PM to make sure we were all still here (and we were). We were amused but not surprised.

Harold was surprised and definitely not amused. After hiding from his followers and the press for a few days, he announced that May 21st was a “spiritual” judgement day and the world will definitely end on October 21st. Since he predicted that he and his followers would be in Heaven by now, watching the rest of us dealing with earthquakes and other disasters, you have to figure it sucks to be him. I can only imagine what he will say on October 22nd.

Finally, here’s my question: before May 21st we were all warned that the Rapture could happen at any time. The message was clear: don’t sin because the Rapture could happen right after your worst sin. That won’t look good to God who decides who goes and who stays. But now we know that the Rapture won’t happen until October. Doesn’t that give us a free summer? Sin with abandon in June, July, August, September, and the first two weeks of October. Then repent by October 21st and be among the saved.

If I were the Las Vegas Visitor’s Bureau I’d be all over this.

By the way, Family Radio still has a web page announcing the end of the world on May 21st.

Am I sinning by laughing at this?

OK, I’m writing this on May 21, 2011 at 6:17 PM. I have to admit a certain amount of disappointment as I was hoping to be raptured by now. According to Family Radio today was supposed to be the day that all those who were “with God” were supposed to be taken to Heaven. The rest, and I guess I am included here, are supposed to endure earthquakes, unreturned phone calls and other natural disasters. I’m kind of OK with that as long as I find someone who was raptured who left their car keys on the front seat.